A Bundle of Sticks: A husbandman who had a quarrelsome family, after having tried in vain to reconcile them by words, thought he might more readily prevail by an example. So he called his sons and bid them lay a bundle of sticks before him. Then, having tied them into a fagot, he told the lads, one after the other, to take it up and break it. They all tried, but tried in vain. Then untying the fagot, he gave them the sticks to break one by one. This they did with the greatest ease. Then said the father: “Thus you, my sons, as long as you remain united, are a match for all your enemies; but differ and separate, and you are undone.” (Aesop’s Fables)

Schools nowadays have to handle more and more maladjusted children. (= problem children)

She lay in bed with T.B. (= tuberculosis)

They parted after two years of marriage. (= divorced)

I’m afraid he has misrepresented the facts. (= lied)

The girl is hard of hearing. (= deaf)

Sometimes I think she sticks too much to her principles. (= stubborn)

Henry is always misinformed. (given false information)

He used poor judgement wherever he went. (= showed himself a fool)

In private, I should merely call him a liar. In the press, you should use the words: “reckless disregard for truth,” and in Parliament– you regret he “should have been so misinformed.”

He worked and worked until he breathed his last. (pass away, lay down one’s life, go to sleep, go out with the tide, go off, go to his long rest, go the way of all flesh, kick the bucket, be no more, depart, join the majority, go west, go to glory, go to one’s account, go to one’s last home, go to a better world)